by Dave Williams | Sep 9, 2024 | Capitol Beat News Service
ATLANTA – A former supervisor in the Glynn County Department of Public Works has been sentenced to 30 months in federal prison after pleading guilty to wire fraud.
William Richards, 51, of Brunswick also was ordered to pay more than $420,000 in restitution of funds he illegally gained from fraudulent charges to government purchasing cards.
Richards, who began working for the public works department in 2010, was responsible for coding and reconciling purchases made with the department’s purchasing cards. The Glynn County Police Department and the FBI began investigating his activities last year when another agency employee noticed suspicious charges on his county purchasing card.
According to court records and testimony, Richards had been making fraudulent purchases with his card and those of other employees for more than two years by issuing payments to a fictitious company he created and then transferring the money to his own bank account.
“Taxpayers rightly expect employees of their government agencies to handle public money responsibly,” U.S. Attorney Jill Steinberg said Monday. “William Richards did the opposite by defrauding taxpayers and enriching himself at their expense, and he is being held accountable for his crime.”
Besides the prison sentence and restitution, U.S. District Judge Lisa Godbey Wood also sentenced Richards to serve three years of supervised release after he completes his prison term.
by Dave Williams | Sep 9, 2024 | Capitol Beat News Service
ATLANTA – Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger Monday predicted smooth elections in the Peach State this year despite rules changes being imposed by a State Election Board he called “a mess.”
Raffensperger told members of the Atlanta Rotary Club reforms his office and the General Assembly have made since the last presidential election in 2020 should give voters confidence that the voting process is fair and honest.
A bill the legislature’s Republican majorities passed in 2021 over the objections of Democrats requires Georgia voters to show a photo ID no matter whether they’re voting in person on Election Day, taking advantage of 17 days of early voting, or voting by mail. Raffensperger said both Democrats and Republicans filed legal challenges against the old signature-match system.
Raffensperger’s office has conducted a statewide audit to ensure only U.S. citizens are registered to vote in Georgia, a check that turned up 1,600 people who could not verify their citizenship. The secretary of state’s office also is working with sister agencies in other states and the Georgia Department of Driver Services to identify voters who may have moved out of state, he said.
Raffensperger expects about 65% of Georgia voters will cast their ballots before Election Day, either through early voting or by absentee ballot. Those who choose to vote on Nov. 5 shouldn’t have to wait more than an hour, he said.
“We’re trying to beat Chick-fil-A for the shortest lines,” he quipped.
However, Raffensperger warned that rules changes three supporters of former President Donald Trump who sit on the five-member State Election Board have approved in recent weeks could hold up the tabulation of results. He said the changes are being made too close to Election Day.
“The counties have already done poll worker training,” he said. “We’ve already built ballots. … It really is difficult to start changing the process.”
Raffensperger said he’s especially concerned with a rule change that will let election officials at the precinct level delay certifying the results if they believe fraud may have occurred. Such delays could prevent counties from turning in their results before the early morning hours after Election Day, he said.
By law, counties must certify election results or face being taken to court, Raffensperger said.
“Then, your choice is you’ll do it or you’ll be in jail,” he said.
While he disagrees with the rules changes, Raffensperger said he has no legal authority to rescind them. The General Assembly removed the secretary of state as the board’s chairman in 2021.
“It’s really their problem to fix,” he said.
Raffensperger urged Rotarians to volunteer to serve as poll workers. The secretary of state’s office is partnering with Vet the Vote, a new nationwide organization that recruits veterans and members of their families to serve as volunteer poll workers.
by Dave Williams | Sep 6, 2024 | Capitol Beat News Service
ATLANTA – The FBI and Georgia Bureau of Investigation released a joint statement Friday afternoon declaring non-credible threats that have been spreading on social media since Wednesday’s school shooting in Barrow County.
Threats of violence naming various schools have been circulating since two teachers and two students at Apalachee High School near Winder were shot and killed Wednesday morning. A 14-year-old student was arrested at the scene and has been been charged with felony murder.
In addition, suspect Colt Gray’s father, Colin Gray, has been charged with second-degree murder, involuntary manslaughter, and cruelty to children for allegedly allowing his son to have the AR-15 rifle used in the shooting spree.
Some parents who attended a news conference Georgia House Democrats held Friday morning to call for passage of gun safety legislation said they decided to keep their children home from school after receiving emails from school administrators citing online threats that named their schools.
Later Friday, the FBI and GBI reported law enforcement agencies are responding to an increase in reported school threats following Wednesday’s shooting.
“School safety hotlines and law enforcement often see increased reporting following a mass shooting incident, as students and the public are more apt to respond to suspicious activity or concerns,” the joint statement read. “Reposting these threats can cause undue panic and spread false information.
“To date, the majority of investigations into threats posed online since the Apalachee High School shooting have been deemed non-credible.”
The two agencies went on to remind the public that law enforcement will investigate and prosecute anyone found making specific threats on social media.
They also asked Georgians who see or hear a threat to report it to local law enforcement immediately but not to share or forward the threat until authorities have had a chance to investigate.
by Dave Williams | Sep 6, 2024 | Capitol Beat News Service
ATLANTA – Georgians do not have the authority to demand that the governor convene an administrative hearing to take up accusations against members of state boards, Attorney General Chris Carr wrote in a legal opinion issued Friday.
Gov. Brian Kemp asked for the legal opinion late last month after Georgia Democrats called on the Republican governor to remove three GOP members of the State Election Board for approving changes to state election laws they said could disrupt the November elections.
The five-member board adopted a series of controversial rules changes last month that, among other things, would empower local election officials to delay or refuse to certify election results. Democrats say that could sow chaos and uncertainty following the Nov. 5 elections and let former President Donald Trump capture Georgia’s 16 electoral votes, even if Vice President Kamala Harris has won more of the state’s popular vote..
Kemp asked Carr for his opinion on whether the phrase “upon charges being filed” in state law means a citizen can present information about a state board member that might constitute formal charges.
“It is my official opinion that … the phrase … does not mean that a citizen can simply submit information to the governor and trigger the hearing process contemplated,” Carr wrote.
Former Fulton County Election Board Chair Cathy Woolard, a Democrat, filed a formal ethics complaint last month against State Election Board members Janice Johnston, Janelle King, and Rick Jeffares – the three who voted for the rules changes – and called on Kemp to refer the complaint to the State Office of Administrative Hearings.
Specifically, Woolard accused the board of violating the state’s Open Meetings Act by meeting in July without the legally required public notice or a quorum. Board members responded by rescinding two rules changes they had made during that meeting and approving them on a second vote in early August.
Max Flugrath, communications director for Fair Fight, a voting rights organization founded by two-time Democratic gubernatorial candidate Stacey Abrams, criticized Carr’s opinion Friday.
“The AG’s opinion leaves a gaping hole where accountability should lie,” Flugrath said. “If the grave, substantive, detailed, and ‘formal’ complaint filed by a former election official is not enough to trigger Gov. Kemp’s legal duty to hold a hearing on the pro-Trump Election Board members’ alleged illegal and unethical actions, the only reasonable conclusion is that the General Assembly wrote a worthless law.”
by Dave Williams | Sep 6, 2024 | Capitol Beat News Service
ATLANTA – The environmental advocacy group Chattahoochee Riverkeeper filed a federal lawsuit Friday charging the city of Atlanta with polluting the river.
The suit follows a letter Chattahoochee Riverkeeper sent in July notifying city officials that they would
have 60 days to stop discharging illegal levels of pollution from the R.M. Clayton Water Reclamation Center or face legal action.
R.M. Clayton is Atlanta’s largest wastewater treatment facility, receiving millions of gallons of the city’s wastewater every day. The facility has been illegally discharging pollutants – including chemicals and harmful levels of bacteria – into the river in violation of both its wastewater discharge permit and the federal Clean Water Act, the suit alleges.
Chattahoochee Riverkeeper notified the city and the state Environmental Protection Division (EPD) last March that R.M. Clayton was discharging large amounts of E. coli and other pollutants into the river, threatening public health, wildlife, and the river’s ecosystem.
City officials initially attributed the facility’s failure to both heavy rainfall and multiple discharges of illicit substances. However, an inspection by the EPD revealed a state of disrepair at the facility, with problems at all stages of wastewater treatment as well as numerous safety hazards.
“The city of Atlanta knows that the R.M. Clayton facility is failing and poses a serious threat to
the health of the Chattahoochee River and all the people and wildlife who depend on it,” said
Jason Ulseth, Chattahoochee Riverkeeper’s executive director. “Yet the city has allowed operational
and maintenance failures at the facility to compound over time, failing to follow through on
even the most basic equipment repairs.”
“For months, the city has failed to alleviate very real public health and environmental concerns
at the R.M. Clayton facility,” added Hutton Brown, a senior attorney with the Southern Environmental Law Center, which represents Chattahoochee Riverkeeper in the lawsuit. “Because Atlanta’s leadership did not step up and show they’re serious about fixing this problem, we had no choice but to step in and ask the court to hold them accountable.”
The suit seeks an injunction to prohibit ongoing violations of the city’s wastewater permit, as well as civil penalties, attorney’s fees and costs.
